Alderson did not write science fiction himself, but for his own amusement created the imaginary planet of Wibblefubwilda, a planet where everyone gets his heart's desire. He died at an early age from complications of diabetes. He is remembered as a patron saint[1] of the Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society, which honored his memory with a parking space reserved in his name in front of their clubhouse until they moved to a new location without dedicated parking.

Alderson devised a Fortran program (called TRAM for Trajectory Monitor) for navigation in the Solar System, still used by low-thrust craft in 2008.[2][3] When Alderson lost his vision to diabetic complications, he was able to continue working at JPL by dictating to an unpaid "seeing eye person." Before he was forced to retire due to medical reasons, he created a complex subroutine package (Portable NameList) in Fortran, strictly by dictation. He organized things so well that he was able to create a number of secondary subroutines and functions, keeping all arguments in a strict order to avoid confusion.[4]

Alderson was a confirmed night owl. It was well known at JPL that, if you saw him at his desk at 8 AM, he'd been there all night. As his health failed, he paid less and less attention to the time, sometimes leaving for a 3 PM appointment at 3:30 PM.[5]